Scrap Iron (2005 Comic Pack)

The original Scrap Iron figure got a lot of play time in my group of early Cobra figures. With his unique accessories and tank-busting specialty, he was a mainstay among the named Cobra characters. He looked mean and nasty, thanks to his rather grim visage (at least what was visible of it under his helmet) and to me seemed like a no-nonsense guy who didn’t have much regard to pleasantries. I don’t know if is was the mystery aspect of his look, but he reminded me of Boba Fett in a way.

The first thing you’ll notice with this version of Scrap Iron is the absence of his missile launcher. Weapon substitution in the 2000s series is nothing unusual, but with such an identifiable element of the figure gone, the total package suffers. Hasbro at least made a noble effort in providing him a large hand-held missile launcher. It’s a nice looking weapon, most commonly associated with Sonic Fighters Zap. Now that makes perfect sense. In fact, I’ve really come to appreciate this substitute.

Speaking of substitutions, switched body parts were a common occurrence as well. Scrap Iron is wearing Cobra Trooper legs in place of his old duds, which he shared with Airborne, by the way–irony? The legs are a decent replacement since they also have knee pads molded in. I find the arm replacement to be an interesting change, as the Thunder arms have a baggier sculpt, and also allow the arms to be posed a little closer to the body.

It wouldn’t be a comic pack figure without a four-color inspired paint scheme. At times, the figures done up in this way seem garish, but the bright variation on the original Scrap Iron uniform is interesting to me. Your mileage may vary, as I’m a sucker for brightly colored figures. It’s just my thing.

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3 comments

The blue hair was lazy, though. I’m not a fan of this figure. It just doesn’t fit any real purpose. But, the Firefly and Serpentor from this pack were both among the highlights of the comic pack figures and they were easily had for $5 per pack clearance prices. So, a few spare Scrap Irons were inevitable and don’t help his popularity with me.

The thunder arms may have been the only original part. If that. The trooper legs were the recasts from the Cobra Infantry 6-pack. The Scrap-Iron head, torso and waist were remade for Urban Strike Division, The detailing is a tad different in spots and the inside of the figure is noticeably redone, so the arms sit deeper inside the shoulder joints (I dislike this) and there’s a bar inside that supports a shorter neck peg (the original Scrap Iron head won’t fit in the torso without modding). I guess Funskool messed up the old mold or Hasbro didn’t get it back.

This figure seems brighter than the comic colors, but I think they wanted to make the most of tooling since Firefly and Serpy had new head sculpts, Scrappy got the short end of the stick.

I really disliked this Scrap Iron due to that deeper shoulder joint. Side by side with the original 1984 Scrap Iron, this is just not a solid feeling figure to me. I didn’t know about the remaking of parts for the urban strike set.

This is one character figure that still needs a good 1987-1992 styled updated figure for me.